The year 2018 has brought serious restrictions for all Binary Options & Unregulated FX Brokers. The growing strict policies ensure the safety of the masses of clients which are promised astronomical returns on their investments by some unethical Binary & FX services provider.

These restrictions have come from some big giants such as Visa, MasterCard, Skrill, Google & Facebook. Let's have a look on how each affects the business of the aforementioned financial services providers.

MasterCard :

The industry giant and one of the biggest payment providers sent out emails to all payment processors informing them about the new changes made by the firm. MasterCard has singled out all binary options, CFDs, Forex, CryptoCurrency & ICOs and flagged them as "High Risk Businesses". Meaning that all business having operations in jurisdictions without licenses will be re categorized into a new risk category for which the clients will be able to execute the charge backs for up to 540 days. This came into effect from 12th October 2018 ensuring that all brokers now play by the rules and do their business in the allowed jurisdictions only.

VISA:

Following the footsteps of MasterCard the payment provider has also decided to curb the unregulated FX,Options, Crypto & ICO business. Visa same like MasterCard will now be considering such businesses as Gambling Providers for the geos they are operating in without license. Acquirers will need to review the clients offering of said products and will immediately terminate all business activities in prohibited markets.This exempts Regulated Brokers however they must apply for being granted these privileges as carrying high risk firms which will still change many things for their business. The new VISA rules will come into effect from 1st December 2018.

Skrill :

Skrill which is one of the brands of the PaySafe Group and one of the widely used money transfer service in the FX sphere globally will now also be asking FX & CFD brokers to provide official copies of their license covering their operations legally. This rule comes into affect from 30th November after which customers from EU countries will not be able to transfer money to such firms. These brokers will however be given 2 weeks in which the company can use Skrill to return the funds of their clients. This move is expected to be followed by other payment companies in EU like Neteller, Webmoney, Fasapay, SoFort & Klarna.

Google:

Since July 2018 the giant Search Engine has placed restrictions over the advertising of Binary Options, Crypto, ICOs,Spread Betting and synonymous products. Brokers offering such services will now need to acquire a certification from google so they can advertise through Google Adverts one of the biggest advertisement platforms of the world.

In order to be able to get the certificate the broker must :

1) Be licensed by the relevant financial services authority in the countries they are targeting.

2)Ensure that their ads comply with googles polices such as the provision of legitimate contact info for a physical address of the business being promoted.

At the start 2018, The Product Director at Facebook, Rob Leathern mentioned in a blog post that "Misleading or Deceptive Ads have no place on facebook". Many companies which were promoting ponzi schemes, crypto offerings and ICOs will now have difficulty in getting their adverts approved. The new rules state that the ''Ads must not promote financial products and services that are frequently associated with misleading or deceptive promotional practices such as binary options, initial coin offering or Crypto currency''.

Conclusion :

All these industry giants coupled together with the new ESMA ensure that small to medium sized investors are safe from losing their money to such firms. The safety mechanism of these big firms complements the new ESMA perfectly however one effect that can be seen from all this is the brokers and the retail investors looking for flexible legal alternative to counter the low leverages and no bonuses and as such only time will be able to tell if these new measures will be successful in limiting the deposits in offshore entities .

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